


My soul, so weary

by ToriCeratops



Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Comfort, F/F, Ryder family secrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-05
Updated: 2017-04-05
Packaged: 2018-10-15 03:59:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10549708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ToriCeratops/pseuds/ToriCeratops
Summary: The fate of an entire galaxy is a heavy burden.  Two is unbearable.  Sometimes you need someone to help hold you together.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A brief moment between Sara and Vetra, set after Sara Ryder unlocks the last of her father's memories. Major plot spoilers ahead. I had a lot of emotions after this event and literally had to stop playing for the night to figure out how Sara would sort through them.

 

 

Sara ran.

She ran from her Hyperion quarters and to the cryo bay with her heart in her throat and tears welling in her eyes.  They stung, but she kept moving.  She ran to Scot, to her mother, to her past and future all mixing up into one.  But more than anything, she ran away.  Her mother was alive, and the rest…

Well the rest would have to wait.

But now she’s not running.  Now, she’s alone in her room on the Tempest.  Tears threaten her again but she inhales deeply and wills them away, begging the tightness in her chest to release.  Now, the silence is overwhelming and the wondrous expanse of space stretches out in every direction she can see.  Once, centuries and more lifetimes ago than she can fathom, people referred to this as the ‘vast nothingness’ of space.  But Sara knows better.  She’s been there.  She’s seen so much.  She’s technically lived for over six centuries now and in two galaxies.  Space is not nothing, it is everything.

And it is crushing her.

The rail she’s sitting on gets uncomfortable after a span of time she long ago lost track of and Sara slides to the floor, inching ever closer to the edge so that all she can see are stars.  Beyond all the tiny, flickering dots of raw power, her home…

“Sara?”  Vetra’s voice floats through her senses, normally a caress that soothes Sara in an instant, this time in snags on something inside, silk caught on coarse dried out skin.  Sara hadn’t even noticed the door sliding open.  There’s a familiar tremor in her girlfriend’s subharmonics, a tone she’s only heard once, down in an abandoned mine what feels like ages ago.

Without turning to greet her, Sara tries to speak but feels the clench of a sob coming and only manages a weak grunt in response.  

The clack of Vetra’s boots on the cold metal floor are slow but sure.  Other, softer noises penetrate the silence followed by a heavy thud and when she comes to take her pace next to Sara, her hard, uninviting chest armor is gone.  Any other day, any other time, Sara would lean in and curl into the perfect, warm curve of Vetra’s body, the smooth fabric of her under armor a slight tickle on her neck.  And she would smile, relax, and just breathe.

Today, she stares at the vast nothingness of space.

“Avitus called me.”  Vetra says as if nothing is out of the ordinary.  Sara loves her just a little bit more.  “Said you missed the pathfinder’s meeting.  They didn’t really get anything done, since it was your meeting and all.  Asked me to check on you.  Said you weren’t answering your coms or emails.  For some reason he thinks I have an inside line.”  She pauses to look over and actually turns off her visor.  “Don’t know where he got that idea.”  There’s a hesitant smile on her face, and her eyes have that light in it that only seems to show up when she’s looking at Sara. 

Sara pulls her knees up to her chest, and looks away.  The tightness in her lungs is spreading through her arms and legs until her hands are even starting to clench uncontrollably.

“Sara..” the tremor of fear and worry comes back stronger than before, even though the tone of her actual words is an attempt at levity.  She runs a gentle hand through Sara’s short hair and the first, real cracks in her resolve to keep it all in start to splinter.  “Sara is this the inevitable breakdown we joked about shortly after we first got on this ship?”  Vetra’s voice lowers, matching the seriousness of her subharmonics.  “Because if it is I can get Lexi.  I’ll stay with you the whole time but…”

“No!”  Sara jerks her head up, a single defiant tear escaping.  “No.”  She says quieter this time.  “I’m not.. not like that anyway it’s just...”  

And for once, Sara can’t find the words.  She’s always so quick to have a response, knows exactly what she’s going to say, how she’s going to handle something, even if it doesn’t alway turn out to be the best.  But now she’s lost.  

Vetra’s arm slips around Sara’s shoulder.  The weight of it, of her, of her love… it’s almost too much. 

Another tear escapes and with it a soft, defeated sigh.  “Vee…”  She turns to finally look up at her, “I know we’ve talked about home before but, have you ever had those thoughts, the  _ maybe one day  _ or  _ what are they up to  _ that just kind of, stick around?”

“What is this about, Sara?”

“I can’t…”  Sara turns away again.  She can’t tell anyone.  She didn’t even tell Scot.  But it’s so heavy, and it hurts so much.  Thoughts of home have always flickered in and out, flashes of day dreams here or there and not ever given a second thought.  Energy spent on things she already knew she couldn’t find answers to or achieve was a waste of time.  Besides, this galaxy was her home now.  And more importantly, Vetra was her new home.  

It’s just that she’d never had such solid evidence of the futility of every fleeting wish before.

“Whatever it is you can trust me.  I love you, and I’m here to give you whatever you need.”  

Their eyes meet one more time and suddenly it really is all too much.  

In a burst of energy she didn’t know she had left, Sara tells her everything.

She tells her about her father’s memories, about her mother dying and having to relive those moments so vividly she wanted to scream.  Then about her father, and his fixation on a cure, on SAM.  Without even a breath she moves on, to the benefactor and the mystery she still has to solve about Jien’s death, to the fact that her mother is  _ fucking alive and in Andromeda with them.   _ Vetra’s mandibles flare in shock when Sara says this, but isn’t given a chance to respond, because then Sara’s tears break and start to flow freely.  

Reapers.  Shepherd.  War.

“...it’s gone, Vee.  Vetra, it’s all gone.  Even if we could go home there’s nothing to go home to. And the worst part is is that it didn’t happen in some distant future from what we left.  It happened to our friends.  To our families… and I can’t tell anyone.  I… I haven’t even told Scot.”  Sara’s chest is convulsing with the strength of her tears and she can’t stop it, not now that the damn has broken.  

Vetra takes a deep breath, pulls Sara to her in a tight and possessive embrace, and lets her be broken.

By the time Sara can take a breath without a hitch in her chest she’s sitting in Vetra’s lap, curled against her chest and letting the quick flutter of her lover’s heart beating soothe her mind.  There’s something else mixed in the sound, harmonizing, soft and subtle, and when Sara shifts it disappears.  

“Thank you for telling me.”  Vetra is weary, but soothing.  “Thank you for trusting me.”  She kisses Sara’s temple, a light, but lingering pressure.

“I don’t know what to do, Vee.”  Sara lays her head back down against Vetra’s chest, this time sneaking her arms around to hold on too.

They are silent for a while, Vetra’s mandible’s shifting in the way they always do when she’s lost in thought.  It’s a soft brush against the top of Sara’s head and she steals a moment for a private, sad smile at the familiar sensation.

“Months ago, I think it was just after we realized the outpost on Eos was going to really be okay and you gave some cheesy speech on the Nexus, I remember Liam making a comment.  He said, ‘I think the Pathfinder’s middle name is Hope.”  Sara looks up at this, curious to where Vetra is going with it but doesn’t interrupt.  “I thought he was serious.  Didn’t know it was an Earth joke until I caught a glimpse of your tags and asked him.  But after a while, even if he was joking at the time, I realized he was kind of right.  You bring hope with everything you do to make things better, sure.  But you also lie, manipulate, and stretch truths so that everyone around you will continue to have hope as well.  Not only that, but you do the dirty work that brings it, you have done things that give you nightmares - and don’t think for a second I don’t know exactly what each one is about - all for the sake of giving our people, all of our people, the best, safest place to live.  You make sure they don’t have to fear for their present, and can focus on a better future.”  

Sara nods slowly. She has done all that and more.  “That’s my job.”  She protests, however weakly.

“No.  That’s who you are.  But that’s beside the point.  My point is is that you do all this and are almost single handedly holding up the hopes and dreams of an entire galaxy…”

“Thanks for the reminder.”  Sara tries to bite out with sarcasm but it comes out weak and almost sad.  

“Another entire galaxy is a bit much to ask of even you.  No matter how amazing you are.  So…”  Vetra smiles and presses more assuring kisses into Sara’s hair.  “That’s where I come in.”  Vetra cradles Sara’s head, holding her gently and keeping her eyes locked on Sara’s.  Her fingers are making slow and pleasing shapes against Sara’s scalp.  “From what you’ve said - the warnings, the messages, the alerts - it does all look very bleak.  But they were fighting, Sara.  They hadn’t lost yet.  You haven’t given up on this galaxy yet, don’t give up on them either.”

“I don’t know…”

“Have faith, Sara.”  She interrupts with a hint of severity. “That someone out there was fighting for them just as hard and relentlessly as you are fighting for us.”

Sara’s body starts to shake again, just the slightest tremor. Eventually, she nods, giving in and letting go.  She closes the gap between them and gives Vetra a fierce kiss as the tears begin once more.  When she stops and takes a breath, she lingers, leaning in so their foreheads rest against each other and continues to cry.

These tears are softer, quieter than the chaos that came before.  They are the ones that come after the storm, when you can still vividly remember the pain, but can start to finally look at what’s left to rebuild.  

She doesn’t know if it’s just knowing that she doesn’t have to carry this alone, or that somehow, when they’re both ready to face this and actually talk about it, she knows they will face this unknown together, but Sara already feels immeasurably better.  She’s not good, she’s not going to be good for a while.  

But Vetra is here.  And Vetra has already proved time and time again the she will hold her up when she can’t do it herself.  That she’ll be there, that they’re in this together.  

Vetra is at her side, holding her close, and Sara is not okay, but she has hope.


End file.
